divine angst

TGIF my foot.

Between the piles of snow that fell on us last night, the frustration of dealing with some administrative hassles, and the never-ending sinus congestion, today has been a pretty pissy day. Fridays always seem to end up like this. I think it’s because, as I finish out the week, I have to deal with all the little things that have piled up over the last five days, and that inevitably leads to me being disappointed in the way someone did something, which leads to me having to put on my “scolding” hat, and GOSH do I hate that hat. I really dislike having to call people out for doing a bad job, especially when those people are capable, intelligent adults. Sigh.

Despite all of the above, I’m not in a wretched mood. But neither am dancing in the streets. I actually suspect the only things keeping me from being in the aforementioned wretched mood are the good feedback I got on a clinic assignment and the 20 minutes I spent watching the dog play in the piles of snow. Since those things bracketed my day (got the feedback early this morning, and just came in from playing with the dog), all the other stuff in the middle is not hitting me as harshly as it otherwise might. I’m going to try and keep it that way.

We have dropped off Himself to be boarded over the next week while we are in Texas with my family. I hate boarding him, but this is really the best option—it’s impossible to fly with an animal, even a relatively small and terribly well-behaved one, and driving is just out of the question in years when we spend the holidays with my family. (The Angst-in-laws are within driving distance.)

The particular trouble this year is that we couldn’t board where we usually do—our vet. Our former upstairs neighbor works at our vet, so we feel very comfortable leaving him there—and they all love him and know his personality and temperament and he comes home happy. But we didn’t call our vet soon enough this year to get a spot over the Christmas holidays, so we’ve had to board him somewhere else, which makes me even sadder than usual. I’m usually pretty sad after dropping him off, but when he’s at the vet, at least I know he’s loved and gets plenty of attention and that makes it easier. This time around, we’ve had to board him at a local kennel—which gets very good reviews all around—but it’s just not the same.

So now I’m sitting at home, taking a little rest before I finish packing and cleaning the apartment, and looking at Himself’s little bed and just missing him. It doesn’t help that I’m watching The Wizard of Oz and Toto is just so cute—and a terrier, with that familiar intelligent gleam in his eye—and I just really wish I had my dog to hug on.

Still really busy. This isn’t a real update. I just wanted to say that we lit a fire in our fireplace this afternoon (because our apartment is COLD) and the dog has found his new best friend. He LOVES sitting in front of that fire. He’s all stretched out on the hearth, soaking up the warm. I keep wanting to watch him instead of working.

Update:

Per request, here’s a pic. He got cuter later, when he flopped over on his side and stretched out.

Himself has recently rediscovered the joy that is chewing on the Kong. (I say “rediscovered”—it happened when we took away another of his toys, one made of fabric, because was starting to hack up little pieces of yellow felt.)

At any rate, he gets a little . . . obsessive . . . with the Kong, to the point of not really realizing where he is or what’s about to happen. Right after this was taken, the Kong fell on the floor, and he followed. I say he’s a smart dog, but . . .

The dog is currently being cute to get my attention.

Must…resist…cuteness….

Since Mr. Angst is working and I am not (and since my school schedule will be . . . not morning intensive) we have swapped doggie duties—Mr. Angst now gets up and takes Himself out early, and I take him out in the evening.

This evening, I was going to wait till 11 to take him out, since he didn’t need to go out earlier, and that pushes the morning walk back a bit. But by 10:30 I was ready to get into my jammies, pick up a book, and settle in, so I took him down then.

As Himself did his business, I felt a sprinkling of rain—just a bit, just a sprinkling—but by the time we got back to the door, the wind was picking up and the raindrops were just a bit heavier. Whew! I thought. Good thing I decided to bring Himself down a bit early.

Good thing, indeed. Because a few minutes ago, I saw a flash of something out of the corner of my eye, and then another, and another. And then the thunder began. Himself went from sitting on the office couch, which is right under a window, to sitting under my desk, right by my feet, even though the actual difference between the two spots is all of two feet. He’s a little quivery and he’s cowering with every flash and roll. I can only imagine the disaster he’d be if I’d tried to take him out to pee in this.

Today, I had to stay late at work to get a couple of things done. This meant that I didn’t take Himself on his evening walk, Mr. Angst did. So his walking time was right around the time when I came home. Usually I would take the west elevator, which is on the same side of the building as our apartment, but I wanted to check the mail, so I went around the other side of the building. After stopping at the mailboxes, I walked toward the east elevator, which also happens to be the pet elevator (dogs aren’t allowed in the other one).

As I walked toward the elevator, I saw a super cute brown and white dog sitting patiently with its owner. I thought to myself, THAT is a super cute little dog. And then I realized, a split second later, WAIT! That’s MY dog! Himself realized I was me right around the same split second, because he jumped to all fours, his tail wagging off his body as I came closer.

I’m sure the other lady sharing the elevator with us thought Himself was the worst little dog ever, because he was just going INSANE. He was whimpering-whining and jumping up to lick my face and hands, and really just going CRAZY. But once she saw that he was just really happy to see his Mom, she smiled a little, even if she did step back into the corner of the elevator while Himself tried to crawl up my leg.

But at the time, all I could think was how cool it was that my dog loves me that much. He’s a good boy.

1) Will someone explain the grand jury to me? I still don’t understand it.
2) The article I did research for last summer has been picked up by a law review. This is very exciting for me. My name! In a footnote!
3) My resume is officially on two pages. I’m not sure what to do about that.
4) Why is a general negligence duty less preferable to a narrower, affirmative duty to comply with some specific standard?
5) We got Himself a new tag (he’s been without one for a while) and now he tinkle-tinkle-tinkles around the apartment. The tinkling woke me up at 6 am today. Boo.

Admin down. Boo-yah. Per normal, I realized approximately three hours after the exam just how royally I had screwed up one particular issue. ROCK. Really, though, I feel pretty OK about it. But I’m finally at this place where the exam process no longer scares the shit out of me. It’s a test. I have to regurgitate all the things I learned over the semester in rough IRAC format in response to a fact pattern in about three hours. It sucks, but it’s just a thing, right? I went in, I took it, and I left.

So, one more exam to go, plus a paper revision (which is not going to write itself, Self, so you better get cracking on that!) and a bunch of editing. And some shopping for work clothes before I start in approximately ELEVEN days. Gasp! (And a hair appointment, because you know it’s starting to look bad when even random people tell you you have a lot of gray. AWESOME.)

But right now, I’m chilling with the dog, debating about whether it warmed up enough for me to change clothes before I take him on his afternoon walk. He’s awfully cute, too–not necessarily chasing squirrels in his sleep, but certainly smelling them.

Ana asked for dog pics. So here are some dog pics. Some of these may be old. But they’re all CUTE!

The dog walker appears to be working out, by the way. I’ve been able to stay at school later every day this week and I’ve been able to get bunches done. It’s good!

It turns out the exact right number of hard-boiled egss needed for an egg-salad sandwich on regular sandwich-sized bread is one and a half. It’s sort of hard to boil half an egg, so I ended up eating half an egg’s worth of egg salad off the plate, where it unceremoniously fell out of my sandwich.

In other news, I’ve been writing all day, doing pretty well at it, and now I’m ready to take a little break. Take one with me! Enjoy, on your break, these photos of Himself.

Watching the street:

Giving me the eye:

Enough with the pictures!

Now that we’re back home, Himself has relaxed back into his normal personality. For much of our Christmas trip to the Angst-in-laws’, he was alternately hyper and subdued, skittish and manic. We’re pretty sure it’s because he thought he was in trouble–no getting on the couches at the Angst-in-laws’, for example–and yet was super excited to have a yard to run around in.

So today he’s been very sweet, and very obedient. He was especially good on his morning walk. I’m glad to see he’s no worse for the wear, and that being home hasn’t been too confusing for him.

[Unfortunately, while on vacation, he picked up a very doggy smell–and I say unfortunately because he had a bath just a week ago! The downside to all that playtime in the yard, I suppose.]

Please, people, for the LOVE OF GOD, keep your animal on a leash when you are outside with him or her. Your dog may be the most obedient little ball of fluff in town, but if he or she gets curious and approaches my dog, who doesn’t really like other dogs, there’s no way for you to get your dog back before my dog reacts and tries to establish his dominance.

(On that note, my dog really needs some training in this area, and we are aware of it and looking into it. But when he’s on a leash and other dogs are on their leashes, I NEVER have problems just scooting past trouble. Which is to say that, other, better trained or more submissive dogs shouldn’t get a free pass just because they are better trained and submissive. Or, rather, their OWNERS should not get a free pass.)

I bought Himself a Kong toy today, with some peanut-butter-flavored paste. He is completely enthralled. What is this red rubber thing that bounces and has food inside??? He works at it for a while, then sits back and stares at it. If he stares too long, I ask him, “[Himself], where’s your toy?” and he’s back at it.

Amazing how a teaspoon of peanut butter paste and a little bit of rubber can occupy a dog for hours.

Every year, I mention how much I hate Daylight Savings, how it completely screws up my schedule when the light changes. (I’m equal opportunity, here, too–I hate it in spring AND fall.)

My complaints were obviously made before I got a dog and assumed the morning walk responsibilities. I am so glad that next week, 7:00 am won’t be pitch black anymore

Seriously. You try finding poop on a bed of leaves with only the yellow streetlights to guide you.

Sometimes all I need is a little dog to remind myself that things really aren’t that bad.

Yes, I was reminded of an assignment due at midnight this morning, and I wasn’t able to get started on it until this afternoon; and yes, I need to be doing research for my comment and actually writing some of the damn thing; and yes, I am about three days behind in my reading for all of my classes.

But I also have a healthy happy dog (who just turned around three times before plopping himself down in the middle of the cushy chair, and I have a yummy dinner in the works, and I have a brand new battery in my computer. I wasn’t really thinking about all those good things today when I thought I was going to completely lose my mind, for thinking of all the work I have to do that I am not getting done. I am now.

That is not to say my stomach doesn’t twinge a little when I realize how busy the next month will be. But I’m hoping if I can get through this semester, next semester will be a little less hairy–and at least I’ll be sort of inoculated to the workload. So for now, I’m going to finish up this assignment and send it on, and then I’ll tackle the next item on the list.

This afternoon, I opened the door to take Himself out for his afternoon walk and came face to face with our upstairs neighbor’s dog.

For background, Himself is not great with other dogs–mostly territorially–and the upstairs dog is also not great with other dogs, though I don’t specifically know what sort of issues he has with other dogs.

As soon as I opened my door, the other dog came towards our apartment, and Himself reacted. The two dogs nipped and snapped at each other, all gnashing teeth and growling, right on my threshold. My neighbor pulled his dog off, and I pulled Himself back inside; my neighbor apologized and asked if Himself was OK and I said he was fine. I closed the door.

[I want to make it clear that I am not blaming the other dog or Himself here; as far as I am concerned, the upstairs dog was either intrigued by our open door or by Himself while Himself was reacting territorially to a large dog coming towards his home.]

Himself was shaking and I noticed a little blood spatter on my wrist. Himself had a little blood on his muzzle, so I led him to the bathroom, where there is good light, and looked him over. He had a spot of blood on the side of his mouth, but it didn’t appear to be bleeding actively, so I figured it was either a very small cut or it was blood from the other dog. I wiped his muzzle, calmed him down, and took him out for his walk. While we were out, I stopped a few times to see if he was OK, and noticed a bit more blood, apparently from his gum. I wondered if he broke a tooth or cut his gum. Our walk was short, because I wanted to get a calmed down Himself back home to check him out further.

Upon returning, I noticed something sitting on the carpet outside our door–a tooth. Himself’s tooth! Himself lost a tooth in the tussle with the upstairs dog! This is what the blood was from–the tooth socket! The whole tooth appears to have fallen out, and it didn’t bleed for more than a few minutes, so I am not TOO concerned. I called my vet and they told me to bring him in tonight, but we’re taking him there in the morning, to board for our out of town trip, so I told her I’d bring him then unless he seemed to be doing badly.

So now I’m sitting at home, Himself curled up next to me, and I’m worried about him. Not about his health–I know he’ll be fine–but about his future behavior. I’m concerned he’ll start having even worse reactions to other dogs (though, while on his walk immediately after the tussle, we passed another dog without any particularly unusual reaction, which is to say Himself pulled a bit, but didn’t growl or lunge).

And, OK, maybe I’m a little worried about his health. What’s up with his teeth that one would fall out during a fight? The vet told us he needs to have his teeth cleaned, but didn’t mention that it was urgent or that Himself’s teeth were in serious condition. But he lost a tooth in an 8-second tussle with another dog!

My evening, understandably, I think, has therefore been a little less than ideal. I thought it would be a good evening–I was very gung-ho to get some work done, I had some really great ideas I wanted to start exploring for my comment, and I thought I might even do some pre-packing for our trip. Instead, I’m sitting on the couch, googling “canine tooth loss” and not finding anything helpful. And being very concerned for Himself, while trying not to act too concerned, such that he would get anxious.

Sigh. The perils of dog ownership. The benefit, of course, is that Himself showers us with so much love.

One of the funniest things we do with Himself is blow in his face. I know, it sounds mean. But it’s actually quite cute, because Himself smells whatever-he-smells on our breath and tries to BITE THE AIR. He licks and bites at the air and then stops and rubs his eyes because they’re getting dried out. And then he licks us all over, because he loves us.

In other words, I am so sad that we have to board him this weekend while we make a road trip to see some family (who don’t know we’re coming and therefore can’t give us permission to bring him to their house). I know he will make new friends (well, I hope he will make new friends), and will be loved on by new people, but it doesn’t make me any happier. I will miss my little man this weekend.

Himself is a funny guy. He is totally unfazed by the super-loud neighbors (I should say “was” since those guys are long moved out). He barely reacts to the train going by. He doesn’t seem to mind how loud our floors are (squeaky AND clicky-clacky from shoes).

But one thing he does freak out about: whenever I go into the lower cabinets to get my big saute pan out, he runs out of the kitchen. And then he stands about four feet out of the kitchen, watching me, while I pull out the pan (or lid or whatever). I don’t know if it’s the noise, but he doesn’t seem to react until the pans make noise, not when I just open the cabinet door.

So he’s a strange fellow, Himself is. Absolutely adorable. But a strange fellow.

#72: People will throw just about anything on the sidewalks and the grass, including glass bottles, plastic bags, and things my dog likes to eat that will make him sick.

This is what I love about having a dog.

I’ve had a long day. I mean, LONG. I raced home for all of 5 minutes earlier today to take Himself out to pee, but otherwise, haven’t really seen him all day. I am now home, and he is curled up next to me, cuddling on me, licking me, super-excited to see me. And that makes me happy. I am happy to just sit here with my dog, watch my DVR’d Project Runway, and drink a glass of wine.

Of course, I have to leave in about an hour for another obligation. Sigh.

I feel like a bad dog owner.

Because of a combination of factors (Mr. Angst is going out of town for five days, I have an interview, and need to go meet the judge I’m working for this semester, and have a meeting with the professor overseeing my comment, and a CLASS), I am afraid Himself is going to be home alone for a long time tomorrow.

If I had some foresight, I would have arranged for a dogwalker. But we haven’t even set up with a dogwalker for them to meet Himself, get keys, sign papers, etc., so that’s not an option. I can try and blaze home between things and just let him out to pee, but I’m not actually worried about his bladder. I’m just worried about him.

He loves being with his people so much that, when we get home from being gone, he is just manically excited. Which makes me suspicious that he’s really sad when we’re not here.

I know, I know, I’m reading too much into him. He has his toys and his bed, and cool, fresh water, so he should be fine, even for an extended day alone. But I still feel bad. (And tomorrow, I won’t even be able to make it up to him in the evening, since I have an obligation then, too. This weekend is just the worst weekend for Mr. Angst to be out of town. Or for me to be losing my mind, either one.)

So, I’m going to be really busy this semester. Between my classes, my office hours, my comment, my externship, and, oh yeah, trying to find a job, I am not exactly sure when I will sleep, eat, exercise, or blog. Don’t worry, though–I’ll find time to do at least three of the four. At least my classes appear to be good, though it’s hard to say after only one day. I am a bit nervous about one of them, seeing as the prof thought I volunteered to answer a question simply because I made eye contact. And here I thought I was just being polite and listening.

The other thing that will be tough this semester will be coordinating schedules with Mr. Angst. He’ll be in class three nights a week, which, among other things, makes me sad. It also means we have to be careful about Himself–making sure he gets his walks, eats at a normal time, and gets plenty of love. Most tricky will actually be this week–Mr. Angst will be out of town Thursday midday through Monday morning, and I have a packed schedule on Thursday. Himself may be alone for quite a while on Thursday, and I am NOT happy about that. I will make it up to him on Saturday, though, when I plan to spend the entire day home–doing work, probably, but home.

The semester has started…and I’m already tired.

He’s just SO CUTE. Seriously.

Day One of interviews down. I was gone most of the day. Mr. Angst says that Himself clearly missed me and was waiting for me to get home. Sigh. I guess Himself is “my” dog.